Brooklyn Nets Were Denied Permission to Interview Doc Rivers

Doc Rivers will be back on the sidelines in Boston next season. According to ESPN, Celtics GM Danny Ainge said “nyet” when the Brooklyn Nets attempted to contact Doc about their vacant head coaching position: “Boston Celtics president of basketball operations Danny Ainge denied the Brooklyn Nets permission to speak to Doc Rivers about their vacant coaching position, team and league sources confirmed. Rivers has three years and $21 million remaining on his contract. The Nets did not retain interim coach P.J. Carlesimo after getting knocked out of the playoffs earlier this month. Reached late Thursday, Ainge refused to comment on the Nets’ interest in Rivers and reiterated that he expects him back on the Celtics’ bench next season. ‘Doc has told me he’s coming back,’ Ainge said bluntly. ‘I talk to him almost every day about our team and what we are going to do moving forward.’ The Celtics’ unwillingness to allow a competing team to talk to Rivers suggests they expect him to honor the extension he signed on May 11, 2011, which made him among the highest-paid coaches in professional sports and one of the top two in the NBA along with the Spurs’ Gregg Popovich.”